Eyes on Fire
by DenizenofTwilight
Summary: In which Clary gets jealous of Jace's training sessions with Brother Zachariah (and is just being pessimistic all around), and Jace confronts her, explaining they have to hold onto hope and each other. A story of fights, healing, and making out, but most of all: pure humor and fluff, and Jace and Clary simply being Jace and Clary. (Set during CoHF or directly before it).


**Eyes on Fire**

Clary paused at the entrance to the Institute, before curling her hand into a fist and preparing to knock. She was being ridiculous, of course, but ever since Maryse had told her of the letter from Sebastian, Clary had come to realize just how bad their situation was.

She was no longer oblivious to how much worse things could get, before they got better.

It was for this reason that Clary had opted to try and see the bad in things of late, rather than the good. It was a strange mental preparation she was going through, she knew, and it wasn't unlike how she'd used to tell herself there was no way she could win art scholarships, as to soften the blow, when the inevitable rejection came.

And now... Clary had chosen to look at the Institute, as the glamour dictated it should be seen: a rundown dump. Though in her head, of course, she knew the Institute was the same as ever, and that she herself was just choosing to see it differently. Subconsciously, though… Clary's mind couldn't seem to separate the two, and thus was the reason she was now knocking on the "new building's" door.

About a second later, Clary had to curse herself for not having had the foresight to enter the Institute the normal way. The last time something like this had happened, she knew, was when the Lightwoods had kicked Jace out of the Institute, without his key. Rolling her eyes at the insanity of her own actions, Clary had to hope that when Jace did come to usher her in, that he wouldn't flashback to that not-so-positive time in his life.

Also… Clary knew Jace would be mad at her, for opting to act like a pessimist again. According to Jace, he was the only one who had the monopoly on that, and Clary's own positive outlook was why he'd fallen in love with her to begin with, but...

It was just so hard for Clary to look at anything positively these days. Even if she was somewhat betraying Jace, in even thinking in such a way. Not that she thought he'd notice her "betrayal", though. No. He would be holed up with the ever-changing Brother Zachariah, and practicing the Angel knew what.

Jumping back, instantly, as the gates barring the Institute swung open, Clary could only stare at Jace in shock as he smirked at her, for almost having been smacked by the door. So apparently Jace was testing her reflexes, then?

And as the idea of only training with Jace—after everything that had happened lately—played itself in Clary's mind, she found that she was suddenly very furious. So Jace would play fire-bender with Brother Zachariah, but wouldn't have time off with her?!

Biting into her bottom lip angrily, Clary remembered that it had been Jace wanting to train with her that had started their entire mess in the first place! If he'd just told her he hadn't wanted to makeout with her, because of the dreams he'd been having, then-

"Well come on in, Fray. Don't stand there like a wallflower all day. We can't have your self-righteousness attitude scaring off the mundanes, now can we? Lay it on me, then, because I've so obviously done something to deserve it."

As Clary stood there for a moment, facing Jace's own livid expression, she was torn between returning his glare with one of her own, or looking at all the flowers and ivy that were starting to twine up the side of the Institute. As it was, she almost was standing directly in it; so apparently, Jace's metaphor hadn't come completely out of nowhere.

Deciding not to get tangled in the underbrush, Clary thought that maybe she should just spend the day fighting with Jace, if that was what he was looking for. After all, if he was already pissed off at her, there was really only one way their evening could go now. Not that she was helping in the department, herself...

"Fine. I'll go talk to you inside. But I warn you, Wayland. Do not call me 'Fray' again. You know I hate that. And it has even more negative connotations to it now, given that you called me that while you were possessed!"

As the liquid fire dissipated in Jace's eyes just for a moment, as a challenge seemed to appear in them instead, Clary very much wanted to throw her hands up into the air, and dare Jace to say what she knew he was thinking.

However, as she didn't exactly want their argument to escalate to them using lethal weapons on each other, either, Clary opted to keep silent, as Jace led her through the chapel part of the Institute, and then up into the elevator.

As the two of them rode up together in silence—glancing at each other every now and then, when they thought the other wasn't looking—Clary thought that maybe she give up the ghost, and try to fix things with Jace. She had started their fight for the day, after all.

"Look, Jace," Clary said just as her breath hitched, upon seeing Jace turn to face her (and the Runes on his arms, in turn, rippled over his shoulders, the way waves rippled in the water), "I shouldn't have come over here acting all prissy. But you have to understand: I have to look at things in an analytical sort of way now. It's the only way I know how to be okay, and react to things without losing my mind. I know it makes you angry, but-"

"Bullshit!" Jace challenged, as he leaned in to Clary, looking very much like the caged lion she'd always associated him with. Idly, Clary thought she might have seen Jace press a button on the elevator, and felt the lift lurch to a stop, but mostly… she was focused on the anger brewing in her partner's eyes, and the way he'd put his arms on either side of her on the wall, so as to keep her from bolting away, as they had it out.

"You're undermining everything we said to each other the day you save me, Clary. We're better together, and if that's not something positive, I don't know what is! You're just retreating into yourself, because you don't want to feel pain anymore. And to that, I say, toughen up and deal with it. Unless you can create a Rune to keep your heart from breaking, than act like a real Shadowhunter, and-"

_"Be the girl you love, right?! That's what this is really about, Jace Wayland, and you know it! But I'm sorry: the world doesn't revolve around you, and if I want to be smarter about things from now on, that's my business. Not yours!"_ is what Clary wanted to say, as she found herself growing even more indignant for Jace trying to tell her how to feel (she also thought very hard about head-butting him, in an attempt to escape. She was almost certain he wouldn't see it coming.)

However, the words that ended up leaving her mouth instead, as she saw—thankfully—Jace being as passionate as ever, further indicating he was no longer under Sebastian's control, were: "All you seem to want to do now is spend time with Brother Zachariah, who has some sort of interest in you. And I know, Jace, that he helped us save you. And I'm so grateful for that, but I don't trust him. He's different than the other Silent Brothers. And he's becoming less like them everyday. He's even starting to look normal somehow, and I-"

_I know that beautiful people can be often times more dangerous than anyone else_, Clary finished her stupid and embarrassing thoughts in her head, as she watched the tension in Jace's body ebb, and his face lighten up the slightest bit.

For a moment, Clary had to wonder if Jace had read her mind, and was reacting to that. She almost wished he couldn't read her so well, because unbidden in her mind were words she'd never say. _"Even you, the most beautiful person to me in the world, has hurt me."_

Flinching away from Jace and the words she hadn't said, Clary found herself ducking under her boyfriend's arms, and padding out onto the floor they'd just reached. She just needed to get her head together, and recover from what Jace had undoubtedly read on her face, and then they could-

"Clary, I'm only spending time with the Brother to get this Heavenly Fire stuff under control. You see that, don't you? I'll admit that it's strange the stuff he knows about me—besides the fact I'm pretty much a house-held name these days, via my stunningly good looks and talents—but I'm hardly dating the man, if that's what you're thinking."

After letting out a breath out she hadn't realized she was holding, Clary was quick to go back into the elevator she'd just evacuated, and pull on Jace's arms, so that he followed her out into the hallway.

Okay this was good. This was progress. Jace had, thankfully, taken away her worries about Brother Zachariah controlling him or something, but more than that: they seemed to be on the best terms that they had been, sine Clary had related to Jace that she had a hard time believing in things anymore.

_"He also doesn't seem to realize I thought about him—Sebastian—hurting me"_, Clary thought to herself, as Jace began backing her into the wall at the rear of the elevator (but under different pretenses than he had just a few minutes prior), and briefly met his lips with hers.

Normally, Clary probably would have protested his advance. Saying that there was still stuff that they needed to talk about, and they hardly could go-at-it somewhere anyone could walk by and see them at any given moment.

Now, though, all Clary found she was capable of, was pulling on Jace's belt loops and bringing his body flush against hers. As the kiss started to go from something tentative to something much more passionate, as she jumped up and wrapped her legs around his waist—and she pulled on his hair so tightly, that she was afraid she might pull it out—Clary couldn't help feeling that somehow the Heavenly Fire was inside of _her_ now.

It wasn't unlike the time she thought Jace had passed on the Fearless Rune to her, just by the whisper of his lips against hers.

Pulling away from Jace for just a moment, as her parched lungs desired some much needed air, Clary told Jace all of this: All the thoughts in her head that Jace had once told her he longed to hear, and now he was. It was nothing short of a miracle, Clary found herself pondering, as she once again thanked every God she knew of that Jace _wasn't_ her brother.

And all the while she thought this—about the miracle that was them—Jace's lips never left Clary's body. Instead, they maneuvered to the hollow of her throat, and began suckling at her flesh in such a way, that Clary thought she might very well faint before all was said and done.

And as she attempted to try and blame Jace for this, Clary found certain words spilling out of her mouth of their own accord: words she would have never said in a million years in any other situation. "God, Jace. You might be an arrogant prick about everything else you say, but I just might have to rethink my denial of you being a sex god. And somehow—

"Oh god, Jace. Don't kiss me on my neck. It tickles. _Anyway_, just being with you like this, seems to make me stronger and better. And-"

"And it's very unsatisfying that you can still somehow talk, even with all I'm doing to you. This isn't a good sign at all. Why do I feel like a rebuttal is about to come from you?" Jace asked first against Clary's throat, then her shoulder (that had somehow come loose of it's tank top strap during their heated kiss). And lastly, against her nose, so that Clary had to laugh, and forget the fact that Jace apparently thought of her as a prude.

She hadn't… she hadn't been planning to tell him to stop. Not this time. Not after everything that had—and still could—happen to them…

"But either way, it's probably a good thing you are stopping us. I still have the Heavenly Fire inside of me, you know," Jace admonished Clary, as if he thought she was some silly and forgetful child, as he bonked her on the nose, and looked at her cheekily (and Clary just _knew_ he was gearing up to say some smartass remark to her). "And I am not a dragon, who can only devour his girlfriend when she's on fire. I'd much rather devour you in such a way you can enjoy this, as well."

"Fuck, Jace! I wasn't going to tell you to stop!" Clary screamed to the heavens, as she threw her hands up into the air, and cursed every God she knew of, that something _always_ seemed to stop them when she and Jace were about to have sex.

"But-but you did demonstrate ample reason why we should, I guess. You should have just left it at that. But then what do you do?" Clary demanded, as Jace seemed about to pull away from her, and instead of allowing that, she just pulled his hips into hers, so that he might suffer, too. "You have to go and use words that should be the eighth deadly sin incarnate. Fuck you, Jace Lightwood. Fuck you!"

"Well, only if you want to." And Jace's smile and tone were somehow so angelic and devilish there, that Clary wondered if maybe Jace really _was_ her brother, after all, and not the fake Sebastian Verlac. Clearly he was much more the epitome of what an angel/demon hybrid _should_ have been.

As an instant and foolproof idea formed in her head then, Clary found herself smacking Jace across the face, before she even knew what had come over her. Folding her arms over her chest, and looking at him in a snooty sort of fashion, Clary answered Jace's unspoken question, with: "That was for the other ten-percent, Jace Wayland. I still say there's at least ten-percent demon blood in you somewhere. And before you say that demons do 'want', and try to make me even more sexually frustrated, just know that I've watched enough cop shows to be able to kill you and leave no forensic evidence."

And to that, Clary found that Jace could only smile at her threat, and whisper a soft and loving, "That's my girl," before dropping a kiss to her forehead, that left them both burning, wanting, and eager to kill Sebastian for putting them both through this sort of slow torture.

Yep, heavenly fire was a bitch, all right. But with Jace by her side, Clary knew that they would be able to weather that—and anything that came—just fine.

Still… despite her earlier qualms with Brother Zachariah, Clary now found herself looking forward to Jace's meetings with him very, very much. It gave Jace the chance to control the fire in him, and for Clary to take a very, very long and cold shower.

_Fin._

**Author's Note: Well, this was fun and different. Somehow, this idea was born from imagining Clary knocking on the Institute door the way that Lily Collins knocks on doors in the movie, and it just grew from there. I really like where this went, actually. And I like that I was able to do something short and funny, in the way Cassandra Clare might write (I tried to write in her style. Could anyone notice?)**

**Anyway, please review, if you liked this. I want to know if my fluff pieces are still good (since I'm a primarily angst writer), or if I should just give up the ghost. **

**Also, this was originally meant to be longer and have more of a story, but I'm trying to remember how to write short things again (yes. This is short for me.), so yeah.**

**I didn't mean for this to come out so sexual, btw. It wasn't supposed to be like this at all, but this is Jace and Clary, so I suppose it's only inevitable. **

**Man, does Cassandra Clare love to torture those two... I could so see something like this happening in CoHF… **

**Gah! Why isn't that book out yet?! I can't wait any longer. Gah!**

**Oh, btw. Kudos to anyone who got the Avatar: The Last Airbender (or Legend of Korra), Game of Thrones, and TMI, in general, references. "****And I am not a dragon, who can only devour his girlfriend when she's on fire. I'd much rather devour you in such a way you can enjoy this, as well."** –** This line** **is the GoT reference. For those who don't get it, dragons in that can only eat or "devour" something that's been cooked (i.e. after they catch it on fire). Get it?**

**Also… Jace DOES have a small fraction of demon blood in him from Tessa. At least he should… but that's all I'm going to say about that;)**

**And with that, I'll bid you lovely people adieu. Hoped you liked my contribution to the TMI fandom. I might just stick around…**

**And does anyone else think Clary getting jealous of Brother Zachariah seems highly accurate? I sure do! LOL.  
**


End file.
